Can Confucian Ritual Improve Mediation?

Abstract

Mediation often fails because disputants scheme, lie, and become emotionally untethered. Productive mediation requires cooperation, self-possession, and a degree of sincerity among disputants. Improving the capacity of disputants to engage harmoniously to achieve resolution is essential, as discussed in the United Nations Convention on International Settlement Agreements Resulting from Mediation (the Singapore Mediation Convention). Confucius believed that ritualized mediation most effectively settled public disputes. Confucian rituals transmit norms and expectations, manifest sincerity, promote self-control, and unite disputants for harmonious resolutions, which can significantly improve modern mediation. This has implications for settlement satisfaction, mediator precision, mediation integrity, social harmony, and savings in time, money, and effort that would otherwise be allocated to litigation. Candidate rituals include calming words and actions during mediation when parties become overly competitive or heated, traditional tea ceremonies, feng shui (風水) influenced mediation environments, and traditional music.